Active art

Whilst in London we came across a few pieces of art and installations that i am going to call 'active art'. This is because the actual art involved a process or the art displayed was a finished product but you could actively do something with it.

The first one is Antony Gormley's One and Other. Located on the fourth plinth in Trafalgar square. This piece of art ran from 6th July to 14th of October. It saw ordinary people occupying a time slot of an hour each in a space normalLy reserved for the elite, for the kings and generals of this nation in statue form.

'There was something very poignant about the sight of a single human on a space designed for a massive statue. Gormley championed the little guy against the intimidating grandeur of the square's institutions ...' (Alex Needham, The Guardian)

Gormley was trying to create 'a representation of the whole of humanity'.


It saw 2400 people have a slot on the piece during the duration of the work being in place.It saw people occupying the plinth, every hour, every day, for twenty for hours a day, for a hundred days, without a break. Occupants were picked randomly from the 35000 people that applied and could do WHATEVER THEY DESIRED whilst on the plinth.

Gormley says,
"Who can be represented in art? How can we make it? How can we experience it? These are questions that have exercised me for years. Whether you see the plinth as a protest or pole-dance platform; studio or stocks; playpen or pulpit; as a frame for interrogation or for meditation, it has provided an open space of possibility for many to test their sense of self and how they might communicate this to a wider world."

SEE www.oneandother.co.uk/